workshops
The Lagoon Workshop, a deep dive into the heart of Venice
To celebrate the release of my upcoming cookbook, Cinnamon and Salt: Cicchetti in Venice: Small Bites from the Lagoon City, I am offering a very special trip that I like to call The Lagoon Workshop! The idea here is to introduce you to a part of Venice that is so often overlooked by visitors to Venice but yet is the “internal organs” of the city, as activist Jane da Mosto says: the lagoon. We will have three nights together and we will... Read More
Tomato paste making at Anna Tasca Lanza, Sicily
It began with 120 kg of tomatoes. Six huge boxes of small, somewhat oval tomatoes of a Sicilian variety called siccagno, from the word secco, dry. They’re grown in tiny bushes, low to the ground, without any water at all. When you cut them open they’re just flesh, no juice, and deep, deep red. They taste almost savoury, as if they’ve been sprinkled with salt. Intensely tomato-y. It’s late August and I’ve arrived (with... Read More
A spring recipe + a workshop at Anna Tasca Lanza Cooking School in Sicily
{UPDATE: We have moved the date of this workshop forward to 30 August- 4 September 2021!} If you love cooking and all of Italy’s regional food traditions then probably you have already heard of Anna Tasca Lanza cooking school in Sicily. It is run by Fabrizia Lanza, whose mother Anna founded the school in the 1980s. Every year Fabrizia hosts a number of students from all over the world at Case Vecchie, Fabrizia’s beautiful nineteenth century... Read More
Foraging, handmade ink and dye workshop + a recipe for dyeing with turmeric
I have always loved wandering the Tuscan countryside (or Melbourne city!), picking plants and flowers to inspire a meal. And ever since learning how to dye fabric with foraged plants (see below for a ‘recipe’), I’ve fallen in love with the idea of sharing this beautiful, sustainable process, along with making handmade natural inks over a truly creative, inspiring few days. So I’m very pleased to announce a new and unique workshop... Read More
Egg yolk ravioli (and a white truffle experience)
One of the highlights of 2019 was hosting the White Truffle and Wine Culinary Retreat here in Tuscany with my husband Marco Lami. We had 13 international guests (from as far as Argentina and Canada and as close as Abruzzo!) together in a big, traditional Tuscan farmhouse, surrounded by woods. It may have rained quite intensely (it was November after all), but we donned rain boots to visit the olive groves and go truffle hunting and during downtime... Read More
What we are drinking now
I have been wanting to talk about wine on my blog, with the help of my sommelier husband, Marco Lami, and now, off the back of our very successful White Truffle and Wine Retreat a couple of weeks ago, I thought I’d share some of the wines we enjoyed that Marco chose for us. “My idea [during the retreat] was to give another perspective of Tuscan wine,” Marco told me, “Tuscan whites tend to be fairly neutral. Trebbiano for example... Read More
Pecorino e Vino: A cheese making and wine culinary retreat, 22-27 June 2020
{UPDATE: SOLD OUT!} I’m so excited to be able to announce that for our new culinary workshop next summer∫, we have Cressida McNamara from Pecora Dairy on board to teach cheese making. Together with me and Marco Lami, my sommelier husband, we will be hosting five wonderful days of cheese, wine and Tuscan food in the Val d’Orcia, one of the most breathtaking parts of Tuscany. We will base ourselves in Pienza, the heart of pecorino cheese... Read More
Ricotta, feta and mint ravioli on a windswept Greek Island
I knew before I even got there that I would fall in love Andros, a mountainous, rugged Greek island, the northernmost of the Cyclades archipelago. When Allegra asked me to host part of a creative workshop at her stunning, cliffside B&B, Melisses, that sits between Chora, the capital, and the port, I jumped at the chance! Mornings began with beautiful breakfasts of summer fruit, copious amounts of thick Greek yoghurt, tahini, and Allegra’s... Read More
Florence food and wine summer workshops
Book right away for July 2-5 here or September 10-13 here! We have had such an incredible response to our White truffle and Wine retreat in November that we couldn’t wait to share a few more dates for similar — but ‘mini’ versions — food and wine focused workshops. The first will be in July 2-5, 2019, and the second will be in September 10-13, 2019, which will coincide with the wine harvest season. We plan to repeat... Read More
A peek at The Puglia Encounter Workshop, Masseria Potenti
One of the highlights of 2017 for me was hosting a food and styling workshop in late October together with two warm and talented women, Saghar Setareh of Labnoon and Alice Adams of Latteria Studio in Rome (for a group of equally wonderful women), in the most stunning location — Masseria Potenti in Puglia’s wine country of Manduria, in the province of Taranto. I remember the excitement of touching down in Brindisi after an early morning... Read More
